A toasted Sandwich

We asked Cousin Kevin to take some piccies in Sandwich, that wonderful medieval town we discovered on our travels, almost by accident. He came up trumps with this weird and wonderful structure we vaguely recalled seeing near the river's edge, but we could not quite remember its purpose. It looked like one of those cages naughty villeins were put in to rot! So Kevin put us to rights: It was a pole beacon.
The structure was filled with wood, rags, and kindling, all to be set ablaze as an ancient fi